Bose ® SoundTouch 20 Series II Wi-Fi Music System - Black

Product Information

It’s a comfortable listen – insightful and clean – and while it may favour a club beat, doesn’t turn its nose up to the more folksy sound of a man and his guitar.

There’s still room for improvement in the sonic and streaming service department, but right now it shapes up to be a good value option for those who are after the whole works. A tiny tab on the right leads you to the options, where you can browse for music. You can also add extra SoundTouch devices for a multi-room system.

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These presets offers instant access to your favorite music without needing your smartphone,tablet, or computer on-hand. It's an incredibly handy and simple feature that combines the ideas of a multi-room audio system with a dedicated Internet radio device. Unfortunately, you can't set any of your favorite playlists from other streaming music services like Spotify if it's not available on the app. Our major issue is the bass. The SoundTouch 20 is capable of diving right down to the depths, but the sound isn’t balanced. The Sonos App will allow you to set up and manage new speakers as you expand your system. If you are using an iOS device, you can use Sonos Trueplay (which is built in to the iOS app) and it will use your device's microphone to calibrate your speakers for optimum performance in whatever room you set up your Sonos. Keep in mind, though, Trueplay is only available on iPhone and iPad. Content comes from whatever device you’re using for control, or from networked computers. Web-based streaming is limited to Pandora and internet radio stations.

But if you want the added convenience and functionality of multi-room and wi-fi as well, the SoundTouch 20 III is a more pertinent choice – not to mention a better proposition than its predecessors offered a year or two ago. The audio performance is good, but not amazing. Sound is clear and volume is never an issue, going louder than you’d ever need it to without hardening. The six preset buttons on the SoundTouch 20 add a ton of convenience through the SoundTouch app. Whatever you're listening to, whether it's a playlist, a genre, an artist, or a single song from your music library or a Pandora or other Internet radio station, you can set it to one of those six buttons just by holding the button down on the radio, the remote, or the app. It can then access that station or (if your computer/storage is on) local music just by pressing the button. With the exception of Trueplay, the Sonos and Bose app experience are pretty similar. One important difference between the apps is the integrated services each system supports. Supported Services When you set up your first Sonos speaker, it will use your home's Wi-Fi to create its own, dedicated wireless network called SonosNet. This wireless system exists outside of your home's Wi-Fi and is the primary method your Sonos system will use to communicate with other speakers in the system and to stream music. SonosNet will reduce congestion on your home Wi-Fi, and will allow you to easily add additional speakers, making it simple to expand your home audio system.In theory, you can plug in an iOS device or computer and just transfer your current settings over, but this didn’t work for us. And if you’ve bought into the whole Apple ecosystem, you may like the system’s network integration. Have a library of your favorite albums and artists? Connect your laptop or NAS drive to have access to your stored music libraries. Both let you program and control speakers throughout your home to play music. You can choose to have the same music on multiple speakers, or different music on individual speakers.

It's important to know the free versions of services (like spotify, Google Play Music, etc.) will not work with the apps on either systems, so if you're planning on getting the best experience from your streaming services, you should be prepared to upgrade to the premium versions. A workaround for the Bose system is to stream via Bluetooth from the streaming app of your choice; however, this means you won't be logged in through the speaker's controller app, so you may only be able to stream on one speaker at a time.

We have reservations about the sound, however, and the limitations with compatibility are hard to swallow. Proceed with caution.